they served, the people whose lives depended on that future.
I heard a soft catch of the door’s latch behind me and expected Tristan, but Owen sat next to me.
“Pretty insane stuff going on, huh?” he said quietly when he caught me wiping my cheek on my shoulder.
“It’s nothing like I expected. I knew we’d be on the run a lot, and I knew we’d have to fight to be together, but I never thought it’d be this bad.”
“It won’t be for long. The Daemoni are still throwing their tantrum after Tristan’s escape. They’ll get bored, quiet down, and abandon the hunt, especially when they won’t be able to find us.”
“That would be a relief. We have other things to focus on without worrying about them.” I sighed. “They’re not the only ones we have to fight for our love. Some of the Amadis don’t want us together. Some don’t want us at all. They’d probably celebrate if the Daemoni captured us.”
“I wouldn’t go that far . . .”
“They think we’ll betray them, Owen. For some reason, they think I have more loyalty to the sperm donor I’ve never met than to the Amadis, to my only family. And they think Tristan will go back, too. Why do they doubt us?”
Owen scrubbed his hand through his hair and scrunched his eyes. When he spoke, the seriousness of his tone and his word choices gave a rare indication of his true age. “There are some who always worried about both of you. You have strong Daemoni blood. So does Tristan. Some believe that even if he wanted to convert, it’s not possible. When he tried to kill you after the Ang’dora . . . that only fuels their beliefs that there’s still something under the surface, waiting for another opportunity to attack. And then there are a few who think he never wanted to, that he’s pulling the ultimate spy job on all of us . . . and that you’ll go along because you love him so much.”
“That’s completely absurd. How could they . . .?”
He shrugged. “He was such a formidable Daemoni warrior for so long, attacking our people, humans . . . innocents. That’s how they remember him, and they can’t believe he could ever change.”
“That was Seth, not Tristan,” I said.
“You and I know the difference, as do most of the Amadis. The ones who don’t knew him much longer as Seth. Some served him before their own conversions and saw the worst of him.”
“But he didn’t like himself then. He never wanted that life. You’d think they’d know more than anyone how much he wanted out of it.”
Owen cut his eyes sideways at me. “Alexis, the Daemoni are cunning deceivers, and Tristan was the best. He did what he had to do to make them happy just to stay alive. If you think he sulked around and defied them all the time, you’re fooling yourself.”
I pressed my fingers to my temples and squeezed my eyes shut, pushing away the images trying to surface—images of Seth’s horrible acts, which Tristan had inadvertently shared with me the night I tried to save Sheree, the were-tiger. “I don’t want to talk about this. My point is that’s not him now. How can anyone not see that?”
“Some people need time. Others . . . well, they might not ever believe. They might not want to believe. Just as in the Norman world, there are always a few who like to stir the pot.”
“I don’t get it. I thought the Amadis were all good.”
“We are good. We find good, and we protect it. But it doesn’t mean we’re perfect, that we don’t screw up.” He shifted, turned toward me. “Listen. We’ll find out what’s going on and take care of this mess, and I’ll bet you the truly good people will be proven right . . . including you and Tristan and Rina. Remember what I keep telling you—in the end, good always wins. We always win.” He patted my knee. “Have some faith, Alexis.”
That was the second time I’d been told to have faith tonight. But my faith was waning.
After Tristan strapped a sleeping Dorian into his seat an hour later, Owen rubbed then thrust his hands at the airplane’s propeller to start the engine, at which point I had no choice but to at least have faith in him—because we were going to fly with magic as our fuel.
As I walked through the house one more time to make sure